Basics part 2
Its easy to get lost. Especially when you're running around like a chicken with your head cut off, looking for love in all the wrong places. Its easy to lose sight of what's really important. Especially when the world is screaming at you at the top of its lungs, and the Word of the Lord (which is Jesus, which is love) speaks in a still, small voice. So what I find myself doing a lot--consciously, on purpose--is making sure I get back to basics. Making sure the things that I'm giving my three t's (time, talent, treasure) to are worthy of my effort. And when someone tells me--and this actually happened to me--that Jesus and my son are the only things I take seriously... I'm pretty ok with that. I would change it up a little bit now because its not just Logan and me anymore. I would say that Jesus and my family are the only things I take seriously. Because, to me, what else matters? One of the pastors at my old church would always say, "As long as we major on the majors and minor on the minors, we should be fine." And she meant that we could fellowship with people who don't believe exactly the same way we do. But I like to take it a step further (I know, I know, I always try to take it a step further) and say that we can find common ground with ANYBODY. In the "church world" or out of it. And I read somewhere that boys look for reasons to be friends, and girls look for reasons to be enemies. Now I'm not going to get into the difference between cats and dogs, but I am trying to say that you can usually find what you're looking for. Unless you're looking for love in all the wrong places. Because love comes from the source. From the God who IS love. But what I'm saying is, sometimes we get these preconceived notions in our heads. We write this narrative. We believe something that is completely untrue. And then we act accordingly. We burn bridges in order to protect ourselves from attacks that aren't even coming. We sabotage ourselves. We don't even give the truth a chance because we are too busy listening to (even the sense of fighting against) the lies of the world. "You're not good enough." So we don't even try. "Nobody loves you." So we don't love nobody. And that is what Jesus was talking about when He spoke of the thief and the robber who tries to get into the sheepfold any other way but through the door. Jesus is the door. Love is the door. So what we do is we rob OURSELVES of the gift we've been given. We miss out on what we've got because we're too busy trying to get something we think we haven't got. To me this is really basic: we have been given the gift of God. You can't earn a gift. You certainly can't earn a gift you've already been given. All you SHOULD do is receive it and release it. Receive it BY releasing it. Freely you have received, freely give. This gift is one to share. Its too good to keep to ourselves. And remember how I said if you believe that nobody loves you, then you won't (can't) love nobody? Well, in the same way, when you know (and believe) that you are loved... that's when (and how) you can love! Give what you've got by knowing what you've got. Share it. Give it away. And when you stop running--when you be still, and know that LOVE is God--that's when you find what you were looking for. That's when you find... yourself.